


Family Recipe

by bombcollar



Series: strawberry shortcake [2]
Category: Bugsnax (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, POV First Person, Post-Canon, References to Drugs, Swearing, symbiote au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-14 04:15:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29164809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bombcollar/pseuds/bombcollar
Summary: An ex-mafia Grumpus is left for dead on Snaktooth.
Series: strawberry shortcake [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2140929
Kudos: 30





	Family Recipe

For the longest time, New Grump City’s underworld feared the name of Jeemo “Big Jimmy” Checkerpelt. The boss’s right-hand man. Reliable. So clean nothing could touch me. But I got sick of that life. Got too old for it. The details aren’t important. Went right to the cops and ratted out every son of a Grump I knew.

Course, I didn’t expect to get away clean. I knew I’d be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my days. But I guess I got sloppy somewhere, because the next thing I knew, I was hit in the back of the head and dumped in a sack. Dunno how long I was out, wavering in and out of consciousness, seeing only darkness through the burlap. I could hear the growl of a motor somewhere beneath me. Then I’m out, thrown into the shallows, and the motor retreats ‘til I can’t hear it no more.

Despite my pounding head, I manage to squirm my way out of the sack. I’m on a beach, waves plowing into me. I scramble further onto the sand and collapse. I hear voices, things crawling up and over me. Crabs or some shit. The sun’s beginning to rise by the time I come to, and I see a goddamn _fruit with eyes_ staring at me. Something little and red. It scampers away, babbling, before I can fully comprehend the nightmare vision that had visited me.

There’s more of them. Little creatures scuttling around in the sand. Crabs made of apple slices. Popsicles with legs. What in the goddamn. They must’ve stuck me with some kind of hallucinogen as a sick joke before dumping me out here. I rub the tender spot on the back of my skull, feeling the egg-sized welt beneath my fur. So this was it, huh? Left here to die on some Grumpforsaken island, to go slowly mad from hunger or isolation. They shoulda just shot me.

Something digs into my side as I try to sit up. I pull it out. It’s a gun. I check the chamber. No bullets. Another funny joke. My head hurts too much to move, so I sit there in the sand, watching the creatures scurry around. They’re kinda cute. I can admit that, now that I know I’m going to die.

I hear something. The thudding of running footsteps as something comes towards me, scrubby seaside brush rustling. Maybe it was a wild animal. Ideally something that could kill me quickly.

What emerges from the bushes isn’t an animal. It’s a Grumpus. Maybe. I don’t really know what I’m looking at, if it’s the drugs or if I really am being confronted with this horrorshow. It’s not large, kind of hunched over like it should be walking on all fours, pink fur, red, wet-looking incisors jutting from its mouth. Arms smooth and furless, striped like candy canes, thin black claws curling from the ends of its fingers. This can’t just be some bizarre animal, because it’s wearing clothes, a blue, knitted poncho and most ridiculous of all, a stupid little beanie with eyes on it. It looks like a strawberry.

I bark out a laugh in spite of myself. Whatever drug they’d given me, I wish they’d left me with more of it.

“Howdy, friend!” It greets me with an open-mouthed grin, revealing more of those sharp, red teeth among its normal ones. Kind of reminds me of strawberry slices, now that it’s drawn closer. I can also see it’s got a tail, long and wedge-shaped, patterned like a goddamn strawberry shortcake of all things. Flat slices of the fruit sprout from the top like the plates on a dinosaur. “Welcome to Snaktooth! I- Oh my, is that a gun?”

I’m pointing the pistol at it. Him. This is a person. _Was_ a person. Despite this, I still feel my lips twist into a fang-bearing grin at the absurdity of it. “Yeah, and if you don’t tell me what’s going on right now, I’m gonna-”

I don’t get to finish the sentence before something explodes out of the mutant Grumpus’s shoulders and rips the gun from my paw. Hot frosting splatters all over my paw and arm, and I’ll admit it, I screamed like a baby, because what the hell else was I supposed to do? It looks like a fat snake with a slice of cake for a head and the same dumb googly eyes as the other creatures, only this one has a mouth full of nasty little teeth that got way too close to my skin. It flings the gun far out into the water and turns to look at me, staring straight into my eyes. “No guns!” It squeaks in the voice of a 2-year-old, layers of cake and frosting flapping bonelessly before it retreats to nestle beneath its host’s poncho.

“What the fuck…” I murmur, shaking the sticky substance off my paw. It clings to my fur, starting to harden into something way too stiff to be regular cake frosting. Nothing about this was regular.

“That’s my lil buddy, Cakerie!” The abomination announces, continuing in that syrupy southern drawl. “And I’m Gramble Gigglefunny. Like I was sayin’ before you tried to _shoot_ me, welcome to Snaktooth.”

Snaktooth. That name is familiar. About a year ago there’d been some murmuring about some naturalist going down there and never coming back. The place was supposed to be a death trap. Good place to disappear folks to.

While I ponder, the abomination – Gramble – keeps talking. “You’re gonna love it here! Snaktooth’s the best place in the whole entire world,” he says, spreading his arms at the surrounding beach. I get a peek at his upper arms, which looks like more layers of cake squashed together, and realize what his paws remind me of. Candles. Birthday candles. If I somehow get out of this alive, I’m never eating cake again.

“What the hell are those things?” is the only question I can pull from my addled mind, as I watch one of those apple-crabs harass what looks like a pineapple spider.

“Those are bugsnax!” He exclaims, pointing to one of the creatures. “They’re wonderful critters, livin’ all over the island. That one’s a Pineantula, and that’s a Paletoss, and that’s-”

Bug snacks? What a load. I hold up a paw to stop his babbling. “Y’know what, forget it. You’re probably not even real. I’m sittin’ here talkin’ to a- a sea lion or somethin’, zonked outta my gourd. The second this wears off, I’m finding a nice cozy spot to hole up and die, so you can go ahead and save yourself the sales pitch.”

Gramble’s cheerful expression falters at that. “…I felt the same way too, y’know. I knew the second I stepped foot on that boat that I wasn’t ever leaving this island, one way or another. And even if that turned out to be true, it doesn’t hafta be all bad. I found the family I wanted here, just not in the way I expected.”

I scoff, spitting into the sand. “My family’s the one that sent me out here. Turned ‘em over to the authorities. I ain’t exactly lookin’ to replace ‘em.”

“Oh, don’t say that…” He looks me briefly up and down. The gears are turning. Even a hick like this had to be aware of the sort of _organization_ I used to be a part of.

“You can be part of our family! You can be happy, too!” Cakerie pips up, sticking their snout out from Gramble’s collar. For a moment, they hesitate, as if choosing their words carefully. Which was ridiculous, because this was a baby cake monster. “You’ll never be lonely again. You’ll never have to be afraid… You’ll never have to worry that they’ll come for you one day.”

A shiver runs down my spine as I meet those dumb, googly eyes. “Hey-!” I point my non-frosted claw in their face. “Don’t try to act like you know me, you fuckin’- confectionary nightmare. How’s about you save us all the trouble and knock my head off with your giant paws instead of whatever it is you got planned. Easy-peasy.”

Gramble chuckles, Cakerie opening their mouth in silent laughter. “Aw, c’mon, don’t be like that. Nobody’s gonna hurt you here.”

“Not everybody gets a choice,” Cakerie adds.

Despite the reassurance I’d just gotten, that feels more like a threat than them nearly biting my hand off. I had a pretty good idea of what happened to those who didn’t accept such a gracious offering. “And what’s the choice, exactly?”

“Become snax,” they reply. “But remember yourself. Or become snax and nothing else. It happens to everybody who comes here, whether they live or die. In the end, they all become snax.”

I nod, licking my dry lips. “Family. The bugs are your family, huh. Like a-”

“A hive,” Gramble completes my sentence for me.

“And I’ll get one of those…” I gesture towards the cake. “…things?”

“No.” Cakerie snuggles into the crook between Gramble’s neck and shoulder. “I was sent to help Gramble. He was dying, but he cared about us, so we returned the love he gave.”

Sappy. Just as well. I wasn’t too keen on sharing my body with something like that anyway. I start to get up. “Fine. Dying to a buncha talking bugs sounds better than dying of starvation on the beach.”

“It ain’t dyin! Just… becomin’ a part of somethin’ bigger than yourself.” Gramble grins at me and grabs my paw in his weird candle-hands. The wax feels warm and sticky. I regret my decision immediately. “Alright! Let’s get you down to Lizbert and Eggabell, they’ll be so glad to meet you!”

As he begins to pull me along, freakishly strong for his tiny size, I smile wryly to myself. Seemed like no matter what I did, I was always going to be part of the family.

**Author's Note:**

> Cakerie belongs to my friend, hibiscushavoc.


End file.
